Wednesday, 23 October 2013

There’s nothing quite like small moments of triumph in
international student life. Whether it’s finding out where to post a letter to
home, buying the proper groceries for the meal you actually intended to cook
(as opposed to the Master Chef-like challenge of cooking with some mystery
ingredient from Albert Heijn), or successfully navigating yourself via bike to a
street with a name like Amsterdamsestraatweg, little achievements feel like big
successes.

My small success this week (although a harder task than you
might think) was finding a true-to-home, classic and delicious Irish breakfast at local pub Mick O'Connells.
Real Irish sausages, bacon, two eggs, baked beans, hash browns and a bit of
toast: my ticket home. Consider it a piece of something familiar for a fraction
of the cost of a plane ticket out of Schiphol. With the stress of studying for
exams and the occasional baffling challenges of being an international student
in a country where you don’t speak the first language, sometimes it’s good to find
something truly familiar. Utrecht is a multi-cultural city, especially in terms
of cuisine, so you don’t have to go too far to find your favourites.

Of course, that’s only half the fun. The other half is being
thrown into a culture that isn’t quite what you’re used to. Beyond tulips,
clogs, windmills and the Red Light District, the Netherlands is a land full of
(very tall) people with their own idiosyncrasies. After you’ve packed your bags
and explained to family and friends that you aren’t moving to Amsterdam (no,
it’s not a country) or even to Holland (you may want to show them this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eE_IUPInEuc),
you will soon discover what really makes the Dutch people stand out.

Those baffling moments I mentioned earlier are (luckily) few
and far between. It may not be the first language, but English is spoken by
almost everyone in this city. It only takes one expression of complete
confusion when someone unknowingly asks you a question in Dutch before they
will happily switch to English to accommodate you. The good news is that this
makes international student life fairly easy. The bad news for people like me
(Dutch-speaking wannabes) is that practicing Dutch means asking people to bear
with you while you answer a simple question like ‘Hoe wil je betalen?’ (How do
you want to pay?).

If you’re particularly brave, you might want to learn to
understand ‘Dunglish’, a mixture of Dutch and English that comes from the
direct translation of phrases. Beware: these translations rarely make sense. My
personal favourite is ‘Helaas, pinda kaas’ (Unfortunately, peanut butter), but
you can find countless more on the aptly-named Facebook page ‘Make that the cat
wise’ if you need a good distraction from studying.

Coming into the wintery months, it is essential to wrap up
warm (gloves are a must-have for riding my bright orange bike all winter long), keep an umbrella nearby at all times,
and enjoy the seasonal Dutch dishes such as Boerenkoolstamppot (a delicious
combination of potatoes and kale with sausage) or hearty pea soup. My study snack of choice this week is ‘Oliebollen’, or deep fried dough covered in powdered
sugar. Okay, so they are traditionally eaten at New Year’s and they certainly
can’t be good for you, but what can I say? It’s exam week.

Over the past week, I submitted my first research paper and sat my
first law exam. Even though the grading system is daunting to say the least
(with the mentality that '10 is for God, 9 is for the professor'), I will be
happy to be out of my current no-grade limbo and officially have some of this
Master’s under way. As things move quickly ahead, I jumped on board an
opportunity to do a research internship with the university. The Clinic Program
on ‘Conflict, Human Rights and International Justice’ will count as one of my
classes (7.5 ECTS) and I will be starting the six-month position in just a few weeks.

The end of block one is in sight and it’s time for non-stop
reading, punctuated by voluntarily-attended seminars and newly-discovered Irish breakfasts. Such is the
life of the international student and it’s not bad at all.

Tuesday, 8 October 2013

Autumn has settled over Utrecht, bringing with it sunny
days, evening chills and glasses filled with seasonal ‘Bockbier’. Flowing summer
dresses are replaced by long coats and woolly scarfs, but the pace of life and
bikes remains the same. The Dutch are always on the go, meeting friends and
making appointments around their packed schedules.

Of course, the best way to answer the question ‘Hoe gaat het
met jou?’ (How are you) is always ‘Druk, druk’ meaning ‘Busy,busy!’

In line with this mentality, I have been keeping busy, busy
all week. As week five of the semester begins, we are already passing the
halfway point of the first block of classes. Whereas in undergrad, the month of
October meant preparing for a midterm break and some Thanksgiving dinner, now
it means gearing up for final papers and studying for class exams.

Each Friday the class workshop is set up to help us prepare
for exams and hone our skills. Theoretical problems solved with group work,
writing workshops and legal research guides make the next task and the upcoming
exams a little less daunting.

With Utrecht being situated so close (only an hour train
ride) to Den Haag (The Hague), there is also a lot to be learned outside the
classroom. On Friday morning, the class took the short train ride to the city
for an organized tour of the International Criminal Court.

Roaming the long white halls of the ICC, with large
portraits of the Judges and Prosecutors of the Court, we learned the history of
the Court and how it is run, from the most routine Registry work to the
complexities of the Court. Stepping away from the classroom and the textbooks
where we study the ICC in-depth, we saw what the Court is like in action and
met the people whose decisions we have studied including Judge Van den
Wyngaert.

While we didn’t get the opportunity to watch a hearing, due
to a closed session, the trip left more than a few of my classmates dreaming of
internships and jobs at the International Criminal Court, and visualizing the
possibility that they could one day be leading tours of academic hopefuls
around the building or have their portrait hanging on the walls.

Leaving the excitement of The Hague behind, there was just
enough time to enjoy the last of the afternoon sunshine in Utrecht and stroll
through the stalls of the city’s popular biological market.

Now, as I sit at my kitchen table, sipping a cup of tea from
home in Ireland (yes, care packages with your favourites are key to
international student life), my focus is on the Moot Court problem ahead, which
is keeping my group, or ‘The Defense’, both nervous and determined.

While the rate of Skype calls to family and friends has
dropped a bit lately, with one mid-week message from my mother asking ‘Are you
alive?’, I like to take this as a positive sign that I’m not only settling in
to this new city but content being ‘Zo bezig als een bij’ (busy as a bee) and
setting my sights on far-off Christmas holidays.